....ing...holes better come up with something new...maybe memory NAND and DRAM is adopting copper...useless analyst crap IMHO to explain after the fact
Novellus shares up on revived merger rumors
Reuters
EE Times
(04/03/2008 6:26 PM EDT)
SAN FRANCISCO -- Novellus Systems Inc.'s shares jumped 6.8 percent on renewed speculation that it was a takeover target and a belief that shrinking orders may have stabilized recently, an analyst said Thursday.
Caris & Co analyst Ben Pang of San Francisco said rumors were flying in the market that semiconductor equipment maker Novellus could be a target of a long-rumored takeover by either Tokyo Electron Ltd or LAM Research Corp.
"There were a lot of rumors about a potential acquisition with the prime candidates being Tokyo Electron or Lam Research," Pang said in a phone interview. "I think there is some credibility to the rumors. But this is an old rumor."
Shares of Novellus rose $1.50 to close at $23.54 on Nasdaq Thursday. The stock remains off 15 percent so far this year.
Novellus and other semiconductor equipment makers are struggling with a downturn in orders for new gear that is likely to take several more quarters to play out, Pang said.
Major acquisitions in the sector typically occur amid such slumps, before a rebound in demand pushes stock prices higher, he said, adding he had no specific information that a bid was in the works.
"Our conclusion is that although industry conditions are still weak, we have not detected another leg down in industry conditions," Pang wrote in a research note to clients. "December and January were very weak, but we think the environment has stabilized since January," he said.
Renewed orders by memory chip makers ahead of the expected seasonal upturn in the second half of the year for semiconductor production has helped stave off further declines, Pang said.
In the U.S. options market, investors traded roughly 21,000 calls -- which enable investors to buy Novellus shares at a fixed price before a set date in the future -- against 3,362 puts, representing 10 times the normal volume, according to option analytics firm Trade Alert. (Reporting by Eric Auchard in San Francisco and Doris Frankel in Chicago; Editing by Tim Dobbyn |
